


The Deadly Complex

by theVelveteenPlatypus



Series: Deja Vu [3]
Category: Monsta X (Band), Shoot Out - Monsta X (Music Video)
Genre: Fan theory, Fugitives, Gen, Minor Violence, Prison, Seven Deadly Sins, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-04
Updated: 2020-01-18
Packaged: 2020-06-09 15:49:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 13,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19479091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theVelveteenPlatypus/pseuds/theVelveteenPlatypus
Summary: To head off an impending apocalypse, seven "deadly" sins were classified and then purged from the world. To do this, the sins were personified and then the personifications were imprisoned to keep them from wreaking havoc on the newly cleansed population. The Deadly Complex became half prison, half museum to commemorate the deliverance of humanity.Based on the music video for Shoot Out.





	1. Prologue: WRATH

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the third installment in a series and I HIGHLY recommend reading the first two before diving into this one, otherwise it'll get very confusing very fast. Thanks for reading and for being so patient while I figure out this story! <3

**Septem peccata capitales**

_ The seven deadly sins are the reason of the apocalypse _

__

_ I _

_ Pride; Pride goes before disaster, and a haughty spirit before a fall _

__

_ II _

_ Envy; Envy has a thousand eyes but It cannot see anything _

__

_ III _

_ Wrath; People who fly into a rage always make a bad landing _

__

_ IV _

_ Sloth; Sloth is denial for purpose of existence _

__

_ V _

_ Greed; Greed is a trumpet calling for a lot of pain _

__

_ VI _

_ Agony; Loving yourself is a prerequisite to be loved by others _

__

_ VII _

_ Loneliness; The world cannot be maintained without cooperation with others _

__

_ These sins are prohibited by law _

\---

Wrath read over the words posted in his room. He had memorized them within the first week of being here, but seeing the words taking up space on an otherwise perfectly good sheet of paper made him angry. To be fair, everything made him angry. Rage always simmered just beneath the surface of his parody of a life. He would pace up and down the length of his room, flashes of crimes that he hadn't committed playing across the backs of his eyelids, and he would feel the anger, the rage, the  _ wrath _ that drove the scenes to their inevitable ends.

He had been created to carry the wrath of the world. The purpose of his existence was to serve as a vessel into which sins were siphoned and then bottled away, safely contained. He had known no other life. And yet… not all wrath was quick to surface. Many of the wrathful sins he now shouldered had been the culmination of months or years or decades of building hatred. Sometimes his stolen memories were of the mundane, with only the beginnings of wrath to color them. He had never set foot outside of The Deadly Complex, and yet he  _ remembered _ going to grocery stores, eating at restaurants, reading books, talking with people he had never met. He had spent one particularly boring day trying to sift through the experiences that had been foisted upon him, and had discovered that he knew upwards of one hundred different languages. He carried the wrath of mechanics and doctors and priests alike, and when they had given up their sinful ways, they had also passed on slivers of themselves.

He carried them all. He had become Wrath for them and in return had inherited a small piece of every soul he had helped cleanse. All of the Sins were like that. In the brief moments they had all been gathered together, he had seen it in their eyes. The knowledge shone through steely gazes, flickers of light forcing its way through hairline fractures… he had heard many a voyeur on the other side of the glass say that their eyes were all so black that they shouldn't sparkle the way they do. They didn't understand. They didn't have to. But they would. He would make them all understand.

Laying on the floor, Wrath closed his eyes and rested his hands on his chest. He felt his heartbeat underneath his fingertips. Slow and steady and strong. Just like he would be, when the time came. He began to replay one of his most powerful carried sins, studying the way it built and formed before finally exploding into chaos. He noted the nuances of this slow-burning wrath. He marked the places where this sinner had let herself be blinded by rage and therefore let it get out of control. Moving onto the next sin, he began again. He was careful and deliberate. He was controlled where they were not.

He had been created to carry the wrath of the world, and as a consequence… he had perfected it. They had given him their wrath believing that he would carry it without becoming it. A fatal mistake. His heartbeat never spiking, he continued to review his long list of sins. As he did, he idly whistled a dirge. The world would know wrath again. Because he was going to bring it to them.


	2. PART ONE

“The Devil never shows you

the consequences of sin.”

\--David Starry


	3. PRIDE

Pride sat on the throne at the back of his room, as he usually did. He could feel eyes on him, from behind the glass that made up the opposite wall and from behind the security cameras that were nestled unobtrusively against the vaulted ceilings in the corners of the room. He resisted the urge to sigh out loud at The Complex designers' ham-fisted attempt at translating his sin into architecture. A throne room for Pride? Truly visionary.

The sarcasm dripping from his thoughts only added to his foul mood, and he leaned against the backrest wearily. He was bored. Taking a handful of gold pills from his pocket, he turned them over with his fingers. With the tactile sensation and repetitive motion occupying his physical boredom, his thoughts began to wander, seeking similar stimulation. When he had first been created, he had been overwhelmed by the sins he had been given to carry. It had taken a month to mentally sort them in his mind but now he hardly noticed them. All of the prideful acts in the world existed within him. He imagined each sin as taking up a thin sheet of cardstock, all of the details neatly filling the two-dimensional surface. He could picture each sin, feel the crisp edges of each one as if he could tangibly turn it over in his hands. He could feel the texture of the words under his fingertips, hear the soft whispers of the sheets sliding against one another as he filed them into their rightful places.

Closing his eyes, he pictured himself delicately paging through the sins, looking for one in particular. He found it quickly and extracted its sheet with care. Some sins, depending on their complexity or severity, filled an entire sheet front and back with tiny print and pictures. But this one was different. This sin took up one quarter of one side of its sheet. There was one picture and three lines of text. That was the entire sin. It was inconsequential, barely qualifying as prideful at all, which fascinated him.

People were so desperate during the time of the purge, that by the time it was over they had volunteered every little thing they had. Every scrap of humanity even slightly dirtied by one of the "deadly" sins was immediately surrendered in the hopes that they could be made clean. He now was the only being alive who felt proud of anything at all. Except for maybe the other Sins.

He filed the sin away again and without opening his eyes, let himself acknowledge the weight of everything he carried. He did this at least once a day, to remind himself of his burden so that he wouldn't take it lightly. When you've been carrying a weight for so long, no matter how devastating, the human mind will normalize it. He had no way of setting down these sins, so he didn't know what it was to be light, but he refused to accept it as normal. It was painful, but he would rather be aware of the weight as it crushed him, for he would be crushed regardless. At least this way, he knew it was because of something outside himself. At least this way, he would know  _ why _ he couldn't breathe.

Returning the weight to the shadows of his mind, he opened his eyes and his room came back into focus. Glancing down at the pills in his hand, cheaply spray-painted gold in an attempt at aesthetic symbolism, he felt a sense of resolve settle over him. Without glancing at the cameras, he let the pills slip through his fingers to fall on the floor. He shifted in his throne, placing his hands on the armrests and sitting up straight. Still as a statue, he stared forward towards the glass. He didn't attempt to make eye contact with anyone on the other side, he simply stared straight ahead and let this new feeling wash over him. He didn't know how, he didn't know when, but he knew with a calm certainty that soon… he would be able to breathe freely. Foul mood forgotten, he felt a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth and did nothing to suppress it. Let them wonder how the sins of the world still haven't crushed him beneath their weight. Let them wonder what Pride has to smile about.


	4. ENVY

Envy sat on a simple bench that jutted out of the wall on the side of his room. He lifted the chains that were bolted to the surface for show, then let them fall with a clang against the surface. He wished for the thousandth time that the bench, the only place to sit other than the floor, was situated further away from the glass that made up the fourth wall of his room. As it was, he was perched a few feet away from the clear surface. He could feel eyes on him and he ignored it as best he could, not wanting to give onlookers the satisfaction of watching Envy studying their every move as they believed he would.

Sure, he was curious about the patrons who visited The Deadly Complex. Anyone would be. But when you're on display, just another exhibition in a hall of horrors, curiosity wasn't worth the fascinated stares he would receive. So instead, he kept his gaze focused on the other three walls of his room. Everything was white, and everything was uniformly smooth save for the door opposite and an air vent currently situated to his left. He had memorized his room and quickly become bored with it even though technically he had known nothing else.

As usual, he closed his eyes and retreated into the sins he embodied. Within them, he knew color and texture and form. He could hardly believe the memories people had given up just because of envy. They were rich with details, millions of rooms of varying shapes, thousands of sceneries that were full to bursting with flora and fauna, and the  _ sky _ …he mentally filtered all of his sinful memories so that he could review the ones that took place outdoors. He was fascinated by the sky. He couldn't believe how many different types of clouds there were, he would kill to see the stars with his own two eyes, and even though he had the memories of these sinners, he would do absolutely anything to be able to personally witness all the shades of a sunset.

With his legs falling asleep from sitting still for so long, Envy stood and began to pace. While circulation returned to his limbs, he was struck by an idea. He casually paced, as he did every day, and kept to the circuit he always walked. There were cameras in the corners of the room along the ceiling, and while he didn't know if they were actively monitored, he didn't want any obvious deviation from his routine to be captured by them. He walked first away from the bench towards the far wall. Twenty paces. He reached out and let his fingers brush against the smooth surface before turning and walking to the back of the room. Fifteen paces. At last, he was returning to the bench side of the room and he turned his focus to the air vent. There were bolts securing the metal into the wall and, as he had suspected, there was a notched line in each by which they could theoretically be turned.

After a few more circuits during which the pins and needles in his feet subsided, he returned to the bench and once again picked up the decorative chains. He wondered how flexible the metal links were, if he could somehow contort the material with his hands or if he would need more leveraging force. More importantly, he wondered if the edges of the links would be thin enough to fit in the notches of the bolts. Letting the chains fall with another clang, he leaned back against the wall. Stretching his arms first above his head and then folding his hands behind his head, he retreated back into his memories with a more definite purpose than simply relieving boredom. It was amazing the memories people had given up just because of a little envy. Who knows? Maybe one of these sinners used to work on air vents for a living. Or maybe he could find a locksmith. As he leisurely sifted through the sins, he found himself whistling a tune he couldn't quite place. It was, quite frankly, rather depressing. Almost a dirge. But he continued with the melody while he worked nonetheless. It was variety in an otherwise bland existence. One that, if he played his cards right, may not last much longer.


	5. SLOTH

Sloth stood perfectly still, his eyes closed and his breathing shallow. His room, an expanse of concrete containing a single cage in which he was now standing, was unrelentingly gray and designed to suppress sound. But if he stood this way and concentrated, he could pretend that his heartbeat and rhythmic breathing were music. He spent his days in muffled quiet, his ears straining for even the smallest variation of sound, and so he had learned to find melodies where he could. He deepened his breathing, listening to his heart slowing with the influx of air. He had created dozens of different "songs" by altering his breaths, one of which had lasted for about thirty seconds before he fainted from lack of oxygen.

The softest click signaled the lock to the cage being disengaged, but it sounded like a gunshot in the relative silence of the room. He had technically never heard a gunshot, but a few of his sinners had, so he knew the general principle of the thing. All of the sins he carried felt like soot, drifting aimlessly through his mind and settling on coherent thoughts in such great numbers that they deadened the outlines of everything. He supposed he was perpetually numb, but he had known nothing else so it was hard to tell.

Exiting the cage into the slightly larger space of his room, he trailed his fingertips across the bars. A barely audible metallic hum resounded from each bar he touched, but he was careful not to make too much noise. When he was first created and placed in this room, the lack of sound had almost driven him mad and he had been reduced to flinging his body at the cage to create any kind of noise at all. That had resulted in them taking away the cage for a week, during which he learned his lesson. When it finally returned, he was careful to keep his outward appearance as sloth-like as possible. He pretended to have no need for sound, so that they could not take it away again in order to punish him. They believed him readily and the cage had stayed ever since. He used the sins he had been created from to craft a mask to wear. He pretended to embody sloth even though, despite carrying all of the sins that should have meant otherwise, he had more drive than all of the other Sins put together. But he wore his mask and they believed him because it was easier for them to.

That was their mistake. They put all of the world's sloth into a human body. Humans have capacity for sloth, obviously, but only in contrast with other things. So Sloth may have carried the sins of an entire world, but at the end of the day, he was still a human being. No one but the other Sins knew he carried a spark within him, and only then because they had seen it in his eyes. Everyone else made their assumptions and wrote him off. Which made him dangerous. But he was infinitely patient.

A hissing sound whispered through the air and Sloth, mindful of the cameras, kept his expression schooled into blankness. He let his head sag on his neck, using the opportunity to flick his eyes around the room in search of this new and exciting sound. The air vent on the far side of the room was emitting wispy tendrils of smoke. He sniffed carefully, thinking that maybe The Complex's guards were trying to drug him, but was surprised by the smell of wood smoke. A whistled, lilting dirge crept into his ears from the grate and he listened with rapt attention. His time of being patient was coming to a close. The world would see soon enough that Sloth wasn't who he appeared to be. In the meantime, he watched the smoke rise and listened as his heart and lungs created a song he had never heard before, twining together with the dirge from the vent. He decided to call it  _ Hope _ .


	6. AGONY

Agony paced around the central installation in his room, annoyed with the small space more than usual. Based on gleaned gossip from patrons loitering on the other side of the glass wall of his room over the last few days, the architects for The Complex had been mandated to incorporate an archaic interpretation of his sin into his room. Apparently only five of the seven Sins had been pulled from ancient history while he and Loneliness had been created to replace Lust and Gluttony respectively. "Agony" must have been more politically correct or some such bullshit. But now that the purge had been completed, the world was left with a lot less to fight about, which meant conflict was created from thin air simply for the sake of conflict. Based on what he understood from piecing together overheard conversations, The Deadly Complex was required to make some sort of adjustment to reflect the alternate interpretations of their sins. Rather than change their names on all the signs, they decided to modify their rooms. Which meant that Agony now had a riot of golden thorn branches tangled together and hanging from the ceiling in the middle of his room.

As he paced, he privately wondered when the world would need another purge and if he and the other Sins would be renewed or be given companions. Not  _ if _ the world would need another purge, but  _ when _ . Humans can never be given a blank slate without marking it up almost immediately. He didn't need to carry anyone's agony or lust to know that. But for now, they thought they were "clean" the poor bastards. They believed they had rid themselves of their worst sins and that their lives would now begin to fall into place… and yet The Deadly Complex not only existed, but was frequented by the masses. As if the people needed to see for themselves that their sins were elsewhere to make themselves believe it. If only Ignorance had been classified as a Deadly Sin. Or Stupidity for that matter. People in agony are tolerable, but stupid people…

A low hissing began echoing off the hard surfaces of the room and Agony whipped his head around, trying to source the noise. He saw what looked like smoke coming through the air vent and tried to puzzle that one out. He half heard, half felt a whistled tune vibrating through the air and an eerie sense of calm settled over him. Being one of the more emotionally-based Sins, he was practiced at feeling the thrum of emotional energy that always emanated from people. Even the visitors to The Complex had vibrations that made their way through the glass sometimes. Closing his eyes against the thickening smoke and to help him concentrate, he found the distinct energies of the other Sins. Something was happening. Something big.

With a feral grin, Agony glanced at the security cameras to make sure they were pointed towards the new installation and what he was about to do. If this was an escape attempt, and he really hoped this was an escape attempt, a little chaos could only help everything along. With an anguished scream born of all the agony he possessed, he reached out towards the thorns and grabbed hold. Hard.


	7. GREED

Greed's room was nothing but a concrete box, a nod to the sins of material greed he carried, but while the other Sins had just glass as their fourth wall he also had a chain link mesh through which people could watch him pace. When The Complex had first opened, there was only the mesh and people had been careless. And by careless, he meant people had pushed their fingers through the gaps to taunt him. He had simply decided to stay away from that particular wall when a new craze swept through in which visitors would throw things through the mesh, trying to hit him. That's the first time he bit somebody. Rather than giving him a glass wall, people were advised with polite signage to not throw anything through the mesh. The signs were ignored after a day or two, which was the second time he bit somebody.

After that incident, a glass wall was put up as a second layer over the mesh so that he could be left alone, but rather than risk a third incident The Complex declared that during visiting hours, Greed would be forced to wear the mask. People loved it. The glass wasn't soundproof, he could hear them jeering and mocking his muzzle. But usually, one look from his glittering black eyes would convince the group they should move on to the next room. Then there would be quiet until the next group who thought they were equally clever.

Greed was pacing when the smoke started. He didn't notice it until his breathing started to labor, and even then it took a while to recognize smoke as the cause considering he had to wear this ridiculous mask while patrons were inside The Complex. The source of the smoke seemed to be the room's only air vent, and for the first time ever, he wished the glass wall was gone. There was nothing to block the vent in his barren room and he didn't think the security cameras were actively monitored, which meant that he was going to suffocate if he didn't do something fast. Deciding he didn't want to suffocate, especially not while wearing a  _ muzzle _ for fuck's sake, Greed strode to the center of the glass and with all the pent up aggression from his mistreatment and the sins he never asked to carry, he began hammering at the surface.

Before long, a crack started to appear. He was relentless. He felt the bones in his hands and the muscles in his arms protesting from the impacts, but he didn't care. He refused to spend his final moments humiliated. He would rather break his own body then let his spirit suffer even a crack. The smoke hurt his eyes and his lungs, but he worked through the haze. Finally, he walked to the far side of his tiny prison, turned back around, and hurled himself at the glass wall shoulder-first. The material shattered under his weight and the smoke rushed through the giant hole until the air was breathable again.

Finally looking at the viewing area, he saw that it was empty of patrons. A red light high on the wall was blinking lazily and the exit signs were flashing. He guessed the building had been evacuated because of the smoke. Without him. Just as he was wondering whether he could break through the mesh in case fire reached his room, the door began to rattle. He backed away, readying himself to fight his way out, when the handle turned and the door swung open slowly.

Envy poked his head around the corner, catching Greed's eye and flashing a humorless smile.

"You coming, or what?"


	8. LONELINESS

Loneliness noticed the smell of smoke immediately. He had been sitting in the back corner of his room directly by the air vent when it started filtering into the space. He stood up and walked to the other side of the room, weaving between the life-sized mannequins that were supposed to symbolize his carried sins or whatever, and waited by the door while the air got thicker with smoke. He didn't know how, but he knew that the door would open a second before it did. The fact that Envy and Greed were the ones behind the door was more surprising, but he simply shrugged and took it in stride.

He stepped over the threshold and followed Envy and Greed down the hallway. He had no idea where they were going, but he was glad to be going somewhere. And he was glad to be with two other Sins… were they meeting up with the other Sins? Were they escaping or evacuating or both? All of his questions rattled around in his brain, but he didn't ask any of them yet. There would be a time and a place for answers, while this moment needed quiet, purposeful movement.

Somehow, Envy knew where he was going, and they ended up at a door with the word "PRIDE" hastily stenciled on in black ink. The door was unlocked and they filed inside, Loneliness being the last one to enter Pride's room. It was a lot bigger than he remembered, with soaring ceilings that made the space feel twice as big as his room despite there being seven people in it right now. There was a strange feeling of déjà vu when the six other Sins turned to look at him, accidentally mirroring the mannequins back in his room, but he adjusted quickly.

Wrath had torn the sleeves off of his jumpsuit and the shredded remains seemed to be wrapped around Agony's hands, the fabric already stained through with blood.

"What happened to your hands?" Loneliness asked.

"New installation in my room," Agony said with a shrug, "Thorns. It's a long story."

"Oh."

Loneliness saw Greed tug on Envy's shirt, motioning towards his muzzle exasperatedly. Envy reached into his pocket and took out two twisted pieces of metal and began fiddling with the locking mechanism at the base of his neck. In a few quick seconds, the muzzle dropped from his face and Greed looked as relaxed as Loneliness had ever seen him.

Greed took off the muzzle from around his neck and threw it across the room. It skidded across the floor and lay crumpled in the corner dejectedly. Loneliness looked away. Good riddance.

"Now what?" Greed asked now that he was muzzle free. His voice was a lot higher than Loneliness remembered.

"Now we leave," Wrath answered simply.

"Where?" Agony asked sharply. "Where the  _ fuck _ are we supposed to go? Everyone knows what we look like, and they're all going to be looking for us."

"You want to stay here?" Wrath retorted, his eyes narrowing dangerously.

Pride sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "Guys. Can we not do this now?"

"I mean, he's got a point," Envy said, quickly throwing up his hands when Wrath swiveled his glare. "I'm just saying he's got a point. Where are we going to go? You have to have some sort of plan, right?"

"Didn't you guys feel it?" Sloth asked quietly from the far side of the group. Six heads turned his way and he blinked at them owlishly. "The shift a few days ago. Didn't you feel it?"

"Wait," Agony said, tapping a finger thoughtfully against his chin. "I've overheard people talking about this. They called it a Rift, something to do with the timelines-"

"What?" Loneliness asked. No one noticed him speak.

Agony continued. "Time travel has been put on hold while the authorities try to sort it out, people are getting really pissed off."

Envy shook his head, "How are we supposed to get our hands on watches if time travelling is on hold?"

Pride raised an eyebrow, "Illegally. Duh."

"Fuck off, Pride."

" _ What? _ " Loneliness said again, louder this time to get everyone's attention.

There was a beat of silence before Sloth explained, "Essentially we need to get Traveling watches illegally and travel to a different timeline using this Rift where people won't recognize us the way they would here. At least that's what I'm understanding."

Nods bobbed through the group and Loneliness looked at each of them in turn. This was maybe the fifth time ever they had all been together in the same room but it felt… right, somehow. He warred with all of the sins he carried, each and every one a weight of being alone that someone in the world didn't want to carry anymore. So they gave them to him even though he had done nothing wrong. He had spent every day of his existence feeling the pain of being alone without any comforting experiences to counteract it, but now here was a group of people who were like him in the ways that mattered. They had all done nothing to deserve their burdens and had to carry them anyway. Simply because no one else wanted to.

"What do we do when we get there?" Loneliness asked, pinning Wrath with his gaze. "Are we going to fuck shit up for what they did to us?"

Wrath stared back, but Loneliness didn't flinch. With another nod, Wrath said, "Yeah. We're going to fuck shit up."

"Perfect. Count me in."

"Me too," Greed said gravely.

Everyone murmured their assent and Loneliness nodded firmly. "Okay then. Step one, we have to get our hands on seven Traveling watches. We need ideas. Go."


	9. WRATH

Wrath stood in the dark surrounded by his fellow Sins. He could feel Loneliness shifting restlessly next to him and he remembered the determined look from their conversation earlier. He was intimately familiar with all forms of wrath, but he didn't need to be well-versed in what the desire for revenge looked like to see it plainly written on the Sin's face. He had always personally thought that, of all the Sins, Loneliness had drawn the shortest stick. To be lonely wasn't a Deadly Sin, it was an inconvenience that people wanted to be rid of. And so the people of the world had given their lonesome memories away during the purge, not realizing or not caring that all of those feelings would be inflicted on a single person. They probably reasoned that it was "just one person" and that it was worth it to be able to live in a world where no one felt desperately alone anymore… but none of them had to live with it. Loneliness did. It wasn't fair.

His pulse spiked at the thought and he reflexively stifled it, returning quickly to his baseline. He would get revenge for Loneliness. He would get revenge for every Sin standing with him now, and only then would he take revenge for himself. After all, he was Wrath. Why carry the sins of the world if he couldn't use them to avenge what they all had lost?

A shuffling in the hallway outside drew his attention back to the dark of the room. He saw a shadow break up the bar of light shining beneath the door and he tensed his muscles for action. If they were right, each of their guards would have returned to the building after the fire had been cleared to find their charges. He suppressed another spike of rage at the knowledge that they had been abandoned rather than included in the evacuation. People wanted their sins on display, but if that meant expending effort to keep the Sins themselves safe from harm, then forget it. It just served as another reminder that they were not wanted in this world. When the door opened and they were bathed in light from the hallway, Wrath didn't hesitate to reach for the closest guard and snap his neck. Before the body had even hit the floor, he was two steps towards the next guard.

Thirty seconds later, seven dead guards slumped at their feet and each Sin was claiming a Traveling watch as their own. A minute after that, they all had exchanged their jumpsuits for guard uniforms. Soon enough, they were all in the hallway, locking the door to their past behind them. They had decided that finding less conspicuous clothes in this timeline was too risky because their faces were so well known. Instead, they all synchronized their watches to the same year, linked arms, and pressed their respective triggers.


	10. PART TWO

PART TWO

“For never can true reconcilement grow,

Where wounds of deadly hate have pierced so deep.”

\-- John Milton (Paradise Lost)


	11. PRIDE

_ FOUR STUDENTS MISSING _

_ University representatives have released the names and pictures [below] of four students who have been officially declared missing by authorities. Two math majors and two art majors disappeared mysteriously last week and have not been seen by their professors or classmates since. It is unknown at this time if the students knew each other well or if their disappearances are related in any way. The University has set up a hotline for any information regarding their whereabouts… _

Pride skimmed the rest of the newspaper article, freezing when he reached the pictures of the missing students. He read the names printed beneath them.  _ Kihyun, Wonho, Shownu,  _ and _ Minhyuk _ . He whispered the names out loud a few times, rolling the foreign sounds around in his mouth as a plan fell into place in his mind. Rolling up the paper, he walked to rejoin the other Sins.

They were gathered in a warehouse while they tried to find different accommodations, but Pride didn't mind. He would have been happy to stay here, but the general consensus seemed to be that seven men coming and going from an abandoned warehouse would be conspicuous sooner rather than later. Greed and Sloth were currently planning on finding a library of some sort where they could get access to a computer. Their sinners combined spent a lot of time and money on computers, so it made sense that they would take the lead in the technological side of researching their next plan of action.

Walking to the center of the group, Pride cleared his throat to get everyone's attention before passing the newspaper around. It took a few seconds for each Sin to catch on, but once they saw the pictures it clicked pretty quickly.

"Um… Pride?" Loneliness asked, the last one to have seen the article. "Why are our faces in a newspaper article about missing students?"

"I had a hunch," Pride answered with a shrug. "I figured that we would exist on this timeline somewhere, at least our physical doubles would, and so I found a few newspapers and started looking just in case. This was the third one I looked through."

Agony shook his head, "So much for being inconspicuous on this timeline. Our faces went from being on billboards to newspapers. Great improvement."

"It  _ is _ an improvement," Pride insisted. "Don't you see? These people, who look  _ exactly like we do _ are students. They have their own lives outside of a literal prison and the only reason they're in the newspaper is because they're missing. And have been missing for over a week--"

"Are you saying what I think you're saying?" Wrath asked.

Pride raised an eyebrow. "If you think I'm saying that we should take the places of our doubles on this timeline, then yes. That's exactly what I'm saying."

"Wait," Envy said incredulously. "We're just going to… take over their lives?"

"They're missing," Pride snapped back. "They're not even using their own lives right now. Who knows where they are. But at least this way, we have names. We aren't prisoners. We aren't famous for being the most hated  _ people _ in the entire fucking world. Besides, if we do this… the articles will be taken out of the newspapers and then we can disappear. Drop the identities out of the University and use them to make new lives that don't belong to anyone but ourselves."

He let that hang in the air for a few minutes, the other Sins mulling them over. Sloth finally broke the heavy silence.

"Only four of our faces are in this article. What about the other three?"

"The four identities we take can help the rest of us get new ones. I don't know how, but we carry the sins of the world. Surely between the seven of us we can find a way to illegally carve out a space for ourselves in this timeline?"

Greed spoke up, "And once no one has their faces in a newspaper, we can disappear and do whatever the hell we want."

Pride nodded. "Unless anyone has a better idea?"

Agony clapped his hands together. "Nope. I like this idea. Let's fucking do it. What's first?"

"First," Pride answered, "The four of you have to be found. We need to figure out a plausible reason for why you went missing to feed to the authorities so no one gets suspicious."

"Great," Agony responded. "I can think of ten reasons why a college student would disappear for a week and then drop out of school just off the top of my head. My sinners did all of them. At least twice."

Pride smirked, "So we'll get your stories straight tonight, then tomorrow you'll be miraculously found."

Wrath was squinting at the newspaper article and looked like he was about to crumple it in his hands. " _ Shownu.  _ What kind of name is  _ Shownu _ ? And why the fuck would anyone want to be an art major?"

Sloth rolled his eyes, "At least you're not a math major like this  _ Wonho _ is. I'll honestly be doing my double a favor. No one actually  _ likes _ math, do they?"

Pride interrupted, "Okay, first thing's first. You guys have to get used to saying your own names. You sound… ridiculous."

Loneliness began repeating the name  _ Kihyun _ over and over, with different inflections, and after a few tries it began to sound more natural. Eventually, he looked up at Pride and practiced saying, "Hi, I'm… Kihyun."

Pride nodded. "There you go. That's much better."

Agony raised his hand, "We get to pick different names after this, right? I don't wanna be a  _ Minhyuk _ . It's too hard to say."

Wrath interrupted Pride's response, "I'm definitely changing my name."

Pride pinched the bridge of his nose in exasperation, speaking through gritted teeth. "You can change your fucking name.  _ After _ you drop out of the University."

Envy swiped the newspaper out of Wrath's hands, earning him a glare which he ignored. "And while you guys are dropping out of University, I'll go with Greed to a library. We should make sure that the three other doubles don't have arrest warrants or anything like that. We need a completely fresh start and even though most of my sinners were shit with computers, they were all pretty good at generally stalking other people. If there's anything weird about our doubles that we need to get rid of, we'll find it."

"It's a plan," Pride said with a firm nod. "So tonight--"

"What about you, Pride?" Loneliness asked suddenly. "While the four of us are at the University and Greed and Envy are at the library… what are you going to do?"

Pride straightened. "I was going to check back on our timeline. See if they've sent anyone after us or if there's anything we have to worry about."

Everyone clamored to answer, but he silenced them with a raised hand. "Look. We can't spend the rest of our lives looking over our shoulders. I won't do it. So tomorrow, I'm going to make sure we'll all be safe. Permanently."

"I'm coming with you," Wrath said.

Pride narrowed his eyes. "You'll be at the University--"

"For a few hours, tops. You're going to wait for me to get back, and then we're going together."

With a huff, Pride reluctantly agreed to wait. The rest of their night was spent going over their plan for the next day, with one notable break in which Envy dragged them all onto the roof so that they could watch the sunset together. Pride stood with the other Sins and they all watched the sky explode into a chaos of colors in the course of a few minutes. Their first sunset.

Pride tore his eyes away from the impossible collage of color so that he could see the look of awe on the faces of his fellow Sins. This would work. It had to work. This would not be their only sunset together, and soon enough… they would be safe. Every last one of them. He felt the weight of his carried sins shift slightly and felt a little lighter. He could never put down his burden, but maybe he could find a way to carry it differently outside of The Complex. He looked forward to the day he would be able to breathe, if not freely, then at least easier. Soon, that day would be here. It wouldn't be worth everything he had been put through, but it would have to be enough for him. For them all.


	12. ENVY

Envy sat on the roof of the warehouse alone. The other Sins had gone inside a long time ago, but he couldn't bring himself to leave the company of the few stars brave enough to force their way through the city's light pollution. The sunset had been even more incredible than he had dared hope and was shocked that people didn't build their ceilings out of glass so that they could always see the sky. Pulling his knees to his chest and wrapping his arms around them, he basked in the starlight. It felt like they were staring back at him, matching his intensity, wondering why they had never seen him before. It was the first time he had welcomed attention from anything.

He heard the roof's access door open and swing shut, meaning one of the other Sins had come looking for him. He was preparing an excuse to stay outside, ready to say whatever he had to so that he didn't have to go back within the confines of four walls, but the words never came. He watched Greed walk over without either of them saying anything, and the other Sin simply sat down next to him. Greed leaned back on his hands and let his head roll back on his shoulders. Envy thought it was to look at the stars like he was, but in the low light he could just make out that Greed's eyes were closed.

"It's nice out here," Greed finally said softly. "No walls. No ceiling. No glass or mesh."

Envy murmured his agreement, glad that he wasn't the only one who felt trapped inside the building. They sat like that for what felt like hours, long enough for the constellations to visibly rotate above them. It was peaceful. He realized with a grimace that it was his first peaceful memory.

"Hey, Greed?" Envy asked haltingly. "Do you… do you think that once we make our own memories, outside of The Complex I mean, they'll help balance out the sins we have to carry? I mean, they're not going to go away, obviously. But do you think it'll ever get easier?"

He regretted the words as soon as they were out of his mouth. He wasn't a child and it wasn't fair to Greed to act like one. He was trying to figure out how to apologize when Greed sighed softly.

"Anything will be easier than The Complex. As for our new memories… I guess it depends on how we decide to make them. If we just do bad shit, then we'll be adding new sins to old sins and it won't counterbalance anything. But if we do something good, then maybe. Just maybe, but at least we have the chance, you know?"

"Yeah," Envy said lamely. Clearing his throat and a bit of the awkward silence along with it, he decided to change the subject. "So tomorrow. The library. What are we going to look for?"

Greed shrugged. "Arrest records, warrants, and the generic criminal information we can get from police files. Basic hacking stuff. But since we don't have names for your double, my double, or Pride's double… I was thinking we'd have to do some face recognition and cross reference with as many databases as we can find. The world has got a fuck ton of people in it, and we're operating on the assumption that three people who look like us are in it somewhere. So maybe we'll find them, maybe we won't, but I'm going to do my damnedest to make sure that we can disappear properly. I'm talking vanishing into the fucking  _ ether _ level of disappearing. That's the plan for the library."

Envy stared at Greed openly. "Wow. You've really thought this through."

Greed laughed, a musical sound Envy didn't think he'd ever heard before. Greed had  _ dimples _ . What the fuck?

"You have dimples," Envy said stupidly.

"I do?"

"Yeah. Like, really bad. Especially when you laugh. Or… not bad, just… they're very  _ there _ I guess. I've never noticed them before."

Greed nodded, his dimples fading with his smile. "Yeah. I haven't had a lot to laugh about I guess."

The silence was awkward again, but Envy didn't have the energy to break it. The fact of the matter was that their situation sucked. It was horrible what they had been forced to carry and their lives had been anything but easy, he didn't want to minimize that in any way. He felt the discomfort in the air around him and he memorized it. It strengthened his resolve to do absolutely anything necessary to create a better life for them. Not as Sins, but as people.

Checking his watch, he saw that it was nearing 3am.

"When does the library open?" He asked Greed.

"7. But I figured we should wait until 8 or 9 so that we're not too conspicuous. I don't know how busy libraries get, considering I've never been in one, but we can always break the research into shifts if need be."

"We should get some rest," Envy said, laboring to his feet and stretching his stiff muscles. He reached a hand down to help Greed up, and the other Sin took his forearm in a strong grip. They walked back to the door, and Envy spared one last look up at the stars. It was hard to leave their company, but knowing he could come outside any time he wanted help ease the claustrophobia. And by this time tomorrow, he'll have seen _two_ sunsets. A smile formed on his face and he followed Greed past the threshold without hesitation.


	13. SLOTH

Sloth walked down the echoing corridors of the University's administration building alone. He and the three other Sins who had student doubles had visited the police station this morning, feeding them a story about a weekend camping trip that had accidentally turned into a week-long bender. They had decided to go together, half to save time and half for solidarity, and the officers who took their statements had rolled their eyes but believed the story. People handled stress in strange ways, and college students had a lot of stress to handle. A lot of Sloth's sinners had been students, and they had shut down when overwhelmed, but he drew on those experiences to emote the appropriate remorse and guilt when recounting their sordid adventure that never actually happened.

Based on his experience in The Complex, Sloth knew that people loved being told what they wanted to hear. The police officers ate up the story because it was convenient for them. Not only were four missing persons cases magically vanished from their desks, but they would be able to put a spin on their return for the press so that their department looked good. The officers didn't actually care if the story was true, and didn't press them for details that may have unraveled their lie. They saw an appealing story and accepted it because it was easy. Different timeline, same human behavior.

The police station was only a few blocks from the University, so they had all walked to the campus and quickly found the administration building to gather the necessary paperwork for withdrawal from enrollment. He felt the papers folded in the back pocket of his jeans, and a flash of guilt stabbed through him. Two sheets of paper would ruin everything his double had worked for. The grades he had earned, the money he had spent, the time he had invested…all gone. Sloth shook his head to clear it. Pride was right, their doubles were missing and wasting their lives anyway. He and the other Sins were just…escalating the situation a bit.

After getting the paperwork, their group had decided to split up. They didn't know how widely spread the gossip would be about their missing counterparts, but travelling in a pack would only raise questions. It had been decided that they would walk around the different buildings for a bit, get their faces seen by students and faculty and cameras, and then meet back at the warehouse in two hours to figure out their next move.

Slowing to a stop, Sloth looked around for any kind of signage to give him some idea as to where he was and where he could explore. He happened to be near a building directory, and decided to start there. The entries were organized by floor and then alphabetized, and the first line immediately captured his attention.  _ 1st Floor - Auditorium - 100 _ . He had always wanted to visit an auditorium, a space designed specifically to enhance sound rather than suppress it. He hurried to the nearest room and found the number: 134. He tried the next room and saw the number 133, which meant he was moving in the right direction. With purpose now, he strode down the hallway and soon enough arrived at two sets of double doors with a plaque situated between them that confirmed he was in the right place.

Straining his sensitive ears, he quickly determined that the room beyond was empty. He lightly pressed on the push bar of one of the doors and it moved smoothly beneath his hands. Hesitant, but excited, Sloth walked into the relative dark of his very first auditorium and the breath was stolen from his lungs. A sloping walkway carved a path past dozens, no,  _ hundreds _ of seats, all of them facing a beautifully polished wooden stage that was practically glittering underneath a single spotlight. It was magnificent. He carefully guided the door shut and just stood at the back of the auditorium for a solid minute, feeling the acoustics of the space. He took a few steps forward and stopped again, noting the subtle difference in how sound would travel closer to the stage. He did this, taking three or four steps at a time, until he was aligned with the very first row of seats. The closer you got, the more impressive the acoustics. He wondered…

On impulse, Sloth lifted himself onto the raised platform of the stage and stood directly underneath the spotlight. He closed his eyes and sighed, reveling in the design of this space and how all sound was meant to emanate from exactly where he was standing. He felt powerful. He didn't have to make any noise to know how it would be amplified and spread through the room from here. He didn't have to demonstrate the effect in order to feel it. He just knew.

Sloth paced around the stage a few times, feeling the differences between stage left and stage right, and decided his favorite spot was downstage, front and center. He sat on the edge of the platform and fiddled with his watch until he found a timer, which he set for one hour. He spent that hour in the auditorium, sitting on the stage just out of reach of the spotlight, looking out on the empty seats that had once been filled with people and would be again. He wanted to live here. He wanted to listen to all kinds of sounds exist in a space designed specifically for them. He never wanted to leave.

He decided to add fifteen minutes to the timer. He would be cutting it close in getting back to the warehouse, but he didn’t care. He would run the whole way if it meant he got another few minutes in the auditorium. He closed his eyes and ran through a few of his favorite songs from The Complex, relearning them in the context of safety rather than captivity. He decided to rename all of them except  _ Hope _ . That one he would keep.


	14. AGONY

Agony was the second one to make it back to the warehouse. Loneliness looked up when he walked through the door, nodded a greeting, and then looked back down at the book he seemed to be reading.

"I thought I'd be the first one back," Agony told the other Sin. "I'm half an hour early. How long have you been here?"

"I came straight back after withdrawing Kihyun," he answered, closing the book. "There's so many people at the University, it was… a lot."

"Fair enough."

Agony sat next to Loneliness and plucked the book from his hands unapologetically. He glanced at the cover and then gave the other Sin a skeptical look. " _ Paradise Lost _ ? Are you serious?"

Loneliness blushed and swiped the book back, holding it to his chest. "It's a classic on this timeline."

"Really."

"Yeah--"

"Look, L," Agony interrupted him. "I get it. We're carrying a lot of baggage that isn't ours, and while sins of agony aren't a fucking picnic, I'm sure that the loneliness of an entire world is pretty damn heavy. But you're not alone anymore. You have us now."

"I don't--"

Agony raised a hand to interrupt the other Sin again. "I'm trying to say 'stop moping' as politely as I can manage, but don't push my fucking buttons."

Loneliness sighed wearily. "Okay. Fine. I'll try to stop moping. But Agony, I can't just switch from nothing to everything and make it look easy. I was perfectly alone at The Complex."

"So was I, but you don't see me moping." Agony retorted haughtily, hoping to get a rise out of the other Sin. In three, two, one...

"You aren't  _ listening to me _ ," Loneliness shouted, his words exploding from him like water from a bursting dam. "No one ever listens to me, and I usually don't care, but right now can you just shut the fuck up for  _ one second _ and let me talk?!"

Agony was silent. He had never heard Loneliness raise his voice before. This was progress. He motioned for the other Sin to continue.

Loneliness closed his eyes and took a few measured breaths. When he spoke again, his voice was even and very soft. "We were all isolated to an extent in The Complex, I know that. We had our own rooms and hardly ever got to see each other. But the architects modified my room after the first few weeks. They added a one-way privacy film to the glass. People could see me… but I couldn't see them." Loneliness raised his eyes to meet Agony's. "I had  _ nothing _ . No human interaction of any kind. And now there are people all around me. You and the other Sins aren't as hard to handle because you know what it was like. But at the University, I could  _ feel _ the thousands of people on that campus. Crammed into rooms and crowding the hallways and taking up so much space that I could barely breathe. I had to leave. So I came back here to be alone. And I know how fucking stupid that sounds coming from me."

"It's not stupid."

"Thank you."

"No problem."

Loneliness leaned forward to cradle his head in his hands. "I'm sorry I yelled at you."

Agony shrugged even though the other Sin couldn't see him. "I was being an ass. Besides, I'd rather you yell and be honest with me and yourself than mope. Moping drives me insane. It's like a really half-assed form of self-torture and I have a very low tolerance for it."

Loneliness looked up in surprise. "You're not mad?"

Agony laughed bitterly. "I carry the sins of agony for an entire world and you think I'm going to be mad at you for raising your voice a little and being honest? Give me some credit, L."

Loneliness smiled and it reached his eyes, which made Agony groan.

"Don't get all mushy on me. I'm allergic to happy thoughts, they make me break out in hives. At least that's how the rumors go back on our timeline. Anyway, tell me about this oh-so-fascinating,  _ 'classic on this timeline _ ' book of yours. Did you steal it?"

"Maybe…"

"Wonderful. Gimme."


	15. GREED

When Greed got back from the library after their day of exhaustive research, Envy took off for the roof immediately, leaving him loitering in the entrance. He could hear the others in the main room, which is why he stayed put. He needed some time to think. Alone. He guessed that was why Envy had fled to the roof.

He had enjoyed the library, he liked how open the building was despite being packed with books and computers and other resources. It had remained mostly empty all day, which he found strange. It was free and there was so much stuff to learn and read and experience… he just didn't get it. He had so many memories of strangers from his timeline, but people as a whole had never made much sense to him. The cruelty he had experienced, the greed that drove them to extremes before the purge, the way they treated each other and the world around them, all of it seemed so  _ bizarre _ . They took their lives for granted because they felt entitled to their things and to their place in society. They never considered what it would be like to go without because they believed it would never happen to them.

In contrast, reviewing their arrival at the library brought a smile to his face. The librarian had been nice to him. She had asked if she could do anything for him and he had been so shell-shocked that Envy had to reply for him before steering them back to the computer wing. Envy had tried to talk to him about it, but he had shaken the other Sin off so that they could begin their research. He didn't want to remind Envy that no one had ever been nice to him before. No one had ever asked if they could help him in any way. He had only ever been mistreated by people and tolerated by the other Sins, but the librarian had  _ smiled _ at him. Shaking his head, Greed compartmentalized the memory. He would never forget that simple act of kindness and on his bad days he would be able to hold tightly to it when he felt like he was drowning. But for now, they had a problem to deal with.

Greed went to the roof to fetch Envy and led the way to the main area where everyone else had congregated. They looked at him expectantly and he collected his thoughts before diving right in.

"To start, we found all seven of our doubles," he said. "And you're not going to believe this… they all know each other in this timeline."

Agony's jaw dropped, but before he could form any words Pride interjected. "What are the odds of that?"

Envy answered for them both. "Very low. I tried to do the math, but I got bored. Because I hate math. But that's not even the strangest thing we found."

The attention of the room swiveled back to Greed, who took a deep breath before launching into their discovery. "Not only do our doubles know each other, but the last CCTV footage I could find was of the seven of them together on the day the four students were reported missing. They were all on a train which, according to the footage labels and some quick research, shouldn't have even been running in the first place."

"Where's the train now?" Wrath asked.

"I have no idea. I found the footage by accident on some hacker's backup server, and it's clearly labeled and timestamped as being transmitted from the Montre train, but there are no other records indicating that the train has run at all in the last few years. The feed shows them all together and then it just… cuts to black. The feed was interrupted by something."

"I believe you," Sloth said, "but that sounds impossible."

"I agree," Greed assured him. "Which is why I tried to find out more about the doubles leading up to the time of the footage. It turns out that the hacker whose backup I broke into is  _ my _ double. His name is Jooheon."

Envy cut in, "My double is a hacker too, named Changkyun."

"What about my double?" Pride asked.

Greed hesitated. "Your double was a lot harder to figure out, but if I'm right… his name is Hyungwon and he's the Traveler who's responsible for creating the Rift we've been hearing about."

Pride stared at him in disbelief. "My double is a Traveler?"

"Yeah."

"And he created the Rift."

"I think so."

"Brilliant. Exactly what we needed," Pride deadpanned.

Loneliness spoke up, ticking off his statements on his fingers, "So our doubles, who statistically shouldn't know each other, were last seen on a train that shouldn't be running, and now we have no idea where they are. Is that the gist of what you're saying?"

Greed nodded. "I triple checked everything I could think of. They just vanished."

Silence hung heavy in the room while everyone considered this new information. Greed watched them think, hoping that one of them would have some way to explain this, but he doubted it. They obviously didn't have all of the information they needed, but he had no idea of where else they could look. He had exhausted every resource available to him on this timeline… Greed felt his eyes go round as a new idea whispered through his mind. Envy caught the look and raised an eyebrow at him.

"Wrath and Pride, you guys are going back to our timeline tonight, right?" He asked, speaking even as his theory took shape.

The two Sins looked at each other for confirmation and then back at Greed, nodding quizzically.

"What if…" Greed began haltingly, "What if the reason I can't find them on this timeline, is because they aren't currently  _ on _ this timeline?"

There was a long pause while everyone considered this.

"I don't get it," Agony announced with a frown.

"Guys," Greed said carefully, "We carry an entire world's Deadly Sins. Isn't it a bit strange that no one has come looking for us at all? I mean, it took me a couple of hours to find our doubles and that was because I had to hack into databases where I didn't have legal access. Facial recognition is nearly impossible to avoid with how many CCTV cameras are everywhere."

"Wait," Wrath said, holding up a hand as if he could physically slow down Greed's speech. "Are you suggesting that our doubles from this timeline… are back on  _ our _ timeline?"

Greed crossed his arms. "Well, it certainly explains a lot. And time travel isn't an exact science. They could have accidentally come to this timeline before we even got here, found our doubles, and assumed they were us."

"And if our doubles were all together," said Sloth, "which we've already decided is statistically improbable to say the least, then they would have just jumped to the easiest conclusion. As usual."

"Our poor doubles," Loneliness whispered.

Greed flinched. He hadn't thought about what the doubles would be going through having taken their places. Were they back at The Complex? Was this Jooheon in a cage, muzzled, with no idea what was going on? He shivered at the thought.

Wrath turned abruptly on one heel, and Pride hurried to follow him. "We're going back to our timeline," Wrath threw over his shoulder. "We'll be back soon and then we can know for sure and plan our next move. Hang tight."

A moment later, Wrath and Pride had disappeared through the door, leaving the five remaining Sins in an awkward silence. Loneliness began to pace, looking fretful. Agony, on the other hand, looked like he was about to fall asleep. Everyone coped in different ways, he supposed.

Loneliness stopped his pacing and spun to face Greed. "The train they were on, what was it called and where did it depart from?"

"The Montre train, named for Montre Station. But what are you--"

Loneliness was already walking towards the door and Greed had to run to catch him before the other Sin went through it. He caught Loneliness by the arm and gripped tight to keep him from bolting.

"What are you going to do?"

Loneliness looked panicked. "I'm going to go to this Montre Station and see if I can find anything. Clues or whatever. I don't know. But I can't wait here and do nothing while Kihyun goes through what I went through. No one deserves that. No one."

Greed held onto his arm for a few seconds, but decided to let go. Loneliness scrutinized him, seemingly daring him to stand in his way, but Greed shrugged instead.

"Want company?"


	16. LONELINESS

Loneliness sat at the base of a set of stairs in Montre Station and forced down the panic building in the back of his throat. The station was clean. He didn't know what he had expected to find here, but he had hoped to find at least  _ something _ . Greed had given him instructions on how to get to the platform where their doubles had been the week before, and Loneliness had found it easily enough. He had explored the surrounding platforms and tunnels and stairways and had completed a full circuit of the entire station without finding any trace of their doubles having ever been there. Or anyone for that matter. It was perfectly, infuriatingly clean.

His mind was inevitably drawn back to his room in The Complex, and he helplessly pictured Kihyun there. His double was a college student, a  _ math major _ for fuck's sake, and those four white walls would drive anyone insane with time. Four white walls and nothing to distract you from your thoughts… it was a cruel, lonely prison. Especially for someone unversed in loneliness. He at least was intimately familiar with the feeling, carrying the "sin" because he had been built for it. But this Kihyun was an ordinary person, with an ordinary life. His double was definitely not going to last long, but there was nothing Loneliness could do about it.

He stood and paced along the base of the stairs, trying to think of some sort of solution. Wrath and Pride were in the other timeline right now, hopefully disproving Greed's theory and its horrible implications, but it made sense. The only reason they weren't being hunted right now was because The Complex believed it had recaptured the Sins. Loneliness hated the small shadow of relief he felt at someone else taking his place in The Complex, of some other poor soul shouldering the weight of his situation for a little while, but he was ashamed of his relief. Kihyun didn't deserve to be there. None of their doubles did. Hell, not even he and the other Sins should have to go through that again. It wasn't fair. More importantly, it wasn't  _ right _ .

Thinking back to the very beginning of their escape, he remembered challenging Wrath.  _ Are we going to fuck shit up for what they did to us? _ He had demanded. And Wrath had said they would. But they hadn't. Not yet anyway.

Loneliness forcibly stopped his pacing and made himself climb the stairs that would lead out of the station. Wrath and Pride would be back soon, and he was going to challenge Wrath again. He was going to fuck shit up back on their timeline if it was the last thing he did. And the other Sins were going to help him. As he walked out of the station and into the night, Loneliness vowed that by the time they were finished… The Deadly Complex would never imprison anyone ever again.


	17. WRATH

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry this update took so long, I'm not abandoning this fic, I swear. I don't know when I'll be done, but I'm hoping for sooner rather than later. Thanks for your patience <3

Wrath felt his body lurch away from their old timeline and back to their stolen one. He unlinked his arm from Pride’s and stalked to the center of the warehouse. It was empty, which meant the other Sins were probably on the roof. Catching Pride’s eye, he nodded toward the stairwell.

“Bring them down.”

Pride nodded stiffly, his mouth set in a grim line.

Wrath turned away, waiting for the other Sin’s footsteps to recede before releasing a shaky breath. He willed his heartbeat to slow and tried to collect his thoughts. He needed to present his and Pride’s findings calmly so that they could come up with a new plan of action. They could no longer disappear. They couldn’t create new lives for themselves. Not yet.

_ Greed was right _ .

Footsteps signaled the return of his fellow Sins, but Wrath kept his back turned. He waited until their shuffling settled into a restless silence, then slowly turned. Looking at the group, he decided there was no way to ease into the discussion they needed to have.

“Greed was right,” Wrath said plainly, his voice as even as he could make it. “Our doubles are in The Complex.”

“ _ Shit _ ,” Greed said softly.

“Understatement,” Agony said lazily, the worry in his eyes contradicting his tone.

“We have to get them out,” Loneliness said feverishly. The Sin pinned Wrath with his fiery gaze. “It’s time to fuck shit up. You promised, Wrath. Time to deliver.”

Wrath held the other Sin’s stare, recognizing the determination burning there. It was the same look Loneliness had given him when they first escaped The Complex. Wrath had misgivings about returning to The Complex having just made it out, but he knew Loneliness was right. It was time to fuck shit up.

“I agree with Loneliness,” Wrath finally said. “We can’t leave our doubles on our timeline. But it’s not going to be easy.”

“Oh please,” Envy scoffed, rolling his eyes. “We haven’t had a single easy day in our lives. Besides, we’re  _ the Seven Deadly Sins _ . If anyone can make some crazy plan work, it’s us.”

One by one, the other Sins murmured their agreement. Wrath looked everyone over, seeing sparks of spirit that by all accounts should have been extinguished long ago.  _ If anyone can make some crazy plan work, it’s us _ . Wrath felt the truth of those words in his bones. Now they just had to come up with a crazy plan.

“What if they do it again?” Pride’s voice cut through the room.

Wrath looked up and found Pride studying him intently. Challenging him. “The Complex has already stolen replacements for us from a different timeline, accidentally or not. Even if we get our doubles out, who’s to say they won’t just do it again?”

A somber hush fell over the group. Wrath knew Pride had a valid point. They were living proof that desperate people did drastic things.  _ The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few _ . How many times had he heard that phrase thrown around The Complex? How many times had that justification been hurled against the glass of their exhibits?

“So we burn it down,” Wrath started, “We destroy The Complex and then--”

“And when they build another one?” Pride fired back. “We can’t burn down buildings as fast as they build them. And what if they do another purge? We could delay the process, but we can’t stop it, Wrath. You know how they are. It will never stop.”

“So what do  _ you _ propose we do, Pride?” Wrath spat.

Pride didn’t even flinch. “I  _ propose _ that we think bigger than a prison break and some arson that ultimately won’t amount to anything. It would be a temporary fix, at best. I don’t know how we’ll break this cycle. It’s not convenient. It may not even be possible. But we have to try because it’s the  _ right _ thing to do. I know that I personally cannot settle for anything less, Wrath. Can you?”

Wrath knew Pride was right. They couldn’t just run away from the situation, no matter how dire it seemed, only to let it happen again. They could not foist their problems onto someone else to escape dealing with it. That’s how the first purge was justified. He would not perpetuate the cycle. Not after everything they had been through.

Sloth cleared his throat, pulling Wrath from his spiraling thoughts and commanding the attention of the room.

“I have an idea.”


	18. PART THREE

“It is not only for what we do

that we are held responsible,

but also for what

we do not do.”

\--Moliere


	19. PRIDE

Pride sat on the couch in the tiny living room of the apartment they had chosen as a base of operations to replace the warehouse. The only light came through the window, heavily filtered by dusty blinds. His eyes long since adjusted to the gloom, Pride let his gaze fall to the second to last item they needed before executing their plan. It had taken the better part of a week to find and then obtain this piece of the puzzle and he weighed it in his hands.

He had always imagined that a gun would be heavy. It was surprisingly light instead. Personally, he didn’t believe that a weapon had any business being this light. Killing tools ought to weigh as much as the lives they can take. If they did, maybe people wouldn’t wield them so carelessly.

Pride set the gun down carefully, then cradled his head in his hands. He acutely felt every passing second settle heavily on his shoulders and there was no consolation in knowing the other Sins felt the same way. After Sloth had shared his idea with the group back in the warehouse, a plan had quickly taken shape. It was the most insanely improbable plan they could have come up with, but it was also their only real option. They had gone to bed that night determined, ready to set things in motion, ready to be doing  _ something _ …

That had been two weeks ago.

Tensions ran high. Patience wore thin. Clipped voices and hissed arguments punctuated the waiting, everyone painfully aware that their doubles were spending more and more time trapped in The Complex. Pride knew that he was not the only one remembering how difficult their early weeks at The Complex had been. The terror, the confusion, the despair-- an endless onslaught of hopelessness. They could only hope that their doubles could withstand their prison for a little while longer.

With a heavy sigh, Pride consulted his watch. He frowned. Envy should have been here by now.

As if on cue, Pride heard a key fumbling with the locks on the door. A jangling accompanied by a muttered string of curses led Pride to conclude that Envy had dropped his set of keys. Pride made no move to get up and help with the door. He thought he had earned the right to be petty in situations as small as this one.

With a grunt, Envy finally shouldered his way into the apartment. He squinted into the darkness, eyes settling on Pride.

“You know, Pride,” Envy said, “some people are dark and gloomy just on the inside. Isn’t brooding alone in the dark kind of...cliche? Don’t get me wrong, it’s an  _ aesthetic _ for sure, I just--”

“Fuck off, Envy,” Pride snapped. “What did you expect? Should I be throwing a fucking party? I’m trying to be inconspicuous. That was the plan-- or have you forgotten already?”

Envy put his hands up in surrender, raising an eyebrow at Pride’s outburst. Pride crossed his arms and refused to look at Envy. All the Sins were jumpy and stressed, he knew that, but he didn’t have to apologize for his reaction. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Envy move towards the couch and sit next to him. The worn cushion sagged beneath their combined weight, Pride still looking resolutely away.

“So,” Envy said lamely, “you managed to get the gun.”

“Obviously.”

Pride sighed, regretting his retort as soon as he said it. He was so tired, they all were. He was anxious for this whole ordeal to just be over and behind them.

“Are the others almost ready?” Pride asked wearily, rubbing at his temples.

“Yeah,” Envy confirmed. “They’re setting up some last minute stuff back on our timeline. When they get back, we’ll all head to the station. That’s our last stop before we start this ball rolling.”

Pride nodded. He let the silence stretch between them, breaking it only when he came to the conclusion that Envy was one of the only people who could possibly understand what he needed to say.

“It’s going to be strange,” Pride finally said. “Being back on our timeline, I mean. We’re trading relative anonymity for literal notoriety… best case scenario is still going to be a total shit show.”

“You’re not wrong,” Envy conceded. “But, Pride… it’s going to be different this time. We aren’t in cages anymore, we’re  _ armed _ , and collectively we’re so righteously pissed that we can probably actually pull this off. If anyone can do this, it’s us, Pride. Besides, at the risk of sounding mushy, we’re not alone anymore. We have each other and, honestly, I think that’s why it’s going to work.”

Pride raised an eyebrow, a smile tugging at his mouth. “Are you saying we’ll persevere because of the power of friendship?”

Envy shrugged. “I was going to call it ‘the bonds of shared cruelty and injustice forged in literal hellfire’... but ‘friendship’ works too, I guess.”

There was a beat of silence before they were both overtaken by laughter. They covered their mouths to muffle the sound, which only made them laugh harder. It was so ridiculous, to be laughing at a time like this, but it also felt like the only natural response to their situation.

Eventually their hysteria subsided and they lapsed into a much more comfortable silence than when Envy had first arrived.

“It’s going to work, Pride,” Envy murmured. “It has to work.”

Pride hummed his agreement, leaning forward again so that his elbows rested on his knees. He had never considered himself an optimist, but he inexplicably believed that Envy’s words were true.  _ It’s going to work… it has to work _ .

Envy leaned forward, too. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a gold watch. He suspended it from its chain and the two Sins watched it gently spin through the air. Envy lowered the watch so that it was cradled in his hands. “Our doubles are going to flip.”

“Yep,” Pride agreed.

“What if they don’t--”

“They will.”

“But what if--”

“Envy, stop.” Pride fixed the other Sin with what he hoped was a confident stare. “ _ They will _ .”

Pride returned his gaze to the window. Not sure who he was trying to reassure, he added, “They’ll have no choice.”


End file.
